Antiguan swimmers deliver at St Lucia invitational

The Riptide Swim Team was the most dominant of three local clubs that participated in the 18th Rodney Heights Aquatic Center (RHAC) Invitational held in St Lucia last week.
Riptide finished sixth overall from amongst 27 teams and 314 swimmers from eight competing countries at the event. They finished fourth in the girls’ division and seventh in the boys’ competition.
They bettered the efforts of the two other Antiguan clubs in WAR and AAC Storm respectively. WAR finished 12th overall while AAC Storm finished one place down in the 13th position.
The competition was captured by St Lucia’s Sharks Swim Club.
Swimmers from Grenada, St Vincent and the Grenadines, Barbados, Trinidad, St Martin and Martinique all participated in this year’s meet.
Riptide’s Tanny Esty captured first place in the high point age group boys’ 11 – 12 age category with 75.5 points with Selah Wiltshire (girls’ 7 – 8 category) and Maia Nord-Hadeed (girls 11 – 12) category both finishing second in the high points awards also.
Wiltshire also had good showings in the 25 butterfly and 50 backstroke, setting new meet records while she had a national age-group record in the 200 individual medley.
Nord-Hadeed was also impressive with a new meet record in the 800 freestyle.
Madison MacMillian of AAC Storm was also impressive, achieving new meet records in the 50-metre breaststroke and 25 metres breaststroke respectively in the girls’ 7 – 8 category. 
Angelique Gittens of WAR also had a new meet record in the 400 freestyle. She competed in the girls’ 11 – 12 age category.
Adrian Karam (boys’ 200 freestyle) and William Tranter (boys’ 200 individual medley) also set new national records competing for Riptide during the meet.
The pool event was followed by the open water event which saw 50
participants compete in four races.
Gittens of WAR was the first female and third swimmer to finish in the three-kilometre event. She competed in the girls’ 11 – 12. 
(Neto Baptiste)